We need policies to take pressure off GP surgeries

Winter is always a tough time for our health services. Cold weather doesn't just fill waiting rooms, it makes people sicker.

- Jeremy Balfour, Independent Lothian MSP

Patients arrive in worse condition, stay longer and need more complex care.

In Edinburgh's A&Es we are already beginning to see a familiar seasonal pattern: waiting rooms fill earlier in the day, ambulance arrivals bunch together and the queue for beds creeps steadily upward.

Cold weather inevitably worsens respiratory conditions, heart disease and frailty, driving more people to seek urgent care. But the problem isn't simply the volume - it's the fact that patients are presenting sicker, staying longer and requiring more complex support. When A&E becomes gridlocked, the entire hospital struggles to function.